Saturday, May 31, 2008

By John CheeranSo the stage is set for the second semifinal in the IPL between two Kings. Chennai Super Kings and King's XI Punjab.It is quite likely that Mumbai crowd will again get under the skin of Punjab captain Yuvraj Singh. The Mumbai crowd now have added reason to frustrate Yuvraj after the pugnacious Punjab skipper berated Mumbaikar's for their partisan attitude and Mumbai Indians effectively lost their chances to enter the semifinal thanks to some outstanding fielding efforts from Punjab. That nail biting contest in which Mumbai Indians frittered away their winning position by committing five run outs happened at this very same Wankhede Stadium and the crowd would love nothing better than humbling Punjab Kings.It is also at another level a fight between two emerging leaders in Indian cricket, Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Yuvraj Singh. Dhoni might have pipped Yuvraj to the Indian team captaincy, but here Yuvraj gets an ideal opportunity to show that his fiery attitude too can bring about success compared with MSD'sair conditioned approach to things on an off the field.These - Punjab and Chennai - are really two strong teams. Both rely on outside talent to define their performance. Punjab mightily depends on the Aussie Shaun Marsh to get an explosive start. Chennai's great local guns such as Badarinath has not boomed for some time now.I have a sneaky feeling that both captains will come out something special tonight at Wankhede to set up the title clash with Rajasthan Royals.

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About Me

John Cheeran is an engineer-turned-journalist and has worked in such diverse media as Print, Internet and Radio. Cheeran has an abiding interest in cricket and its politics, and in politics in general.
Cheeran quit an Indian arm of the US-based global giants General Electric in 1994 to join Asian College of Journalism. He then went on to write on sports, and mainly on cricket, for newspapers such as The Indian Express, The Asian Age, The Pioneer and www.timesofindia.com in India. Cheeran also had a seven-year stint with Gulf News in Dubai.
He also wrote regularly for regional publications including Malayala Manorama and Deshabhimani during his student days.
During his career, Cheeran has reported a string of national and international tournaments including the 1999 Cricket World Cup held in England, the annual Dubai Desert Classic Golf Championship and Dubai Tennis Championship in Dubai, the ICC Champions Trophy in Dhaka, the Independence Cup Cricket Championship in India, Asian Test Championship and a number of Davis Cup ties in India. Now, Cheeran is an adjunct faculty at Online Media Centre in Chennai.